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It seems to me that the industries that trend to the most unethical (airlines, commercial real estate, cell phone carriers) also have the highest barriers to en

It seems to me that the industries that trend to the most unethical (airlines, commercial real estate, cell phone carriers) also have the highest barriers to entry. Unfortunately, this only leaves cumbersome instruments like government regulation and unpredictable changes in the marketplace to impose ethics on industries that appear most likely to trend unethical.

ryanlchan 16y ago
Oligopolies, which are dependent on a limited number of competitors, are ripe for corruption, collusion, and cooperative behavior. This is pretty much exactly why the US has antitrust law. Its history is an interesting read on wikipedia if you have the time.
- tptacek 16y ago
  In exactly what sense is commercial real estate an oligopoly?!
billswift 16y ago
Government regulation is what creates most barriers to entry. In general, the most unethical industries and professions are those that are most tied in to government in the first place. Especially where government provides the barriers to entry - professional and occupational licensing being just the tip of the iceberg.
- praptak 16y ago
  "Government regulation is what creates most barriers to entry." Maybe the government regulation as practised by cronyist goverments. Seriously, I don't think that a hypothetical government enforcing standards for square feet measurement would create a huge barrier to entry into the property business.
  - wake_up_sticky 16y ago
    One little thing like this isn't a huge barrier to entry, but a hundred little things like this make a whopper of a barrier to entry.
    - tptacek 16y ago
      The "little things" involved in setting up a restaurant are in totality encyclopedic, and yet mom-and-pop teams start restaurants every day in the US.
      - jeffffff 16y ago
        if you worry about what laws you might be breaking every time you want to do something, you'll never get anywhere. i suspect that most new restaurants are in violation of dozens if not hundreds of laws, but in reality they either aren't enforced or the owners are given an opportunity to fix whatever is wrong without penalty. follow the laws you know, don't go looking for ones you might be breaking, and when the government tells you that you're breaking a law remind them how many people you're employing.
        tptacek 16y ago
        You're probably right in some sense, but there are many laws --- liquor licensing, health inspection, and employment, in particular --- that are actively enforced and a day-to-day reality for restauranteurs.
      - anamax 16y ago
        The money in commercial real estate is in larger projects. Govt gets more involved as the amount of money goes up. The NYC govt doesn't much care about a small deli. It gets seriously involved if you're developing a whole block, or trying to build a wal mart.
  - VengefulCynic 16y ago
    As soon as there's a law about how to calculate square footage there will either be an agency to do the calculate the square footage, an agency to enforce it, or both. Oh, and some sort of tax/fee levied against commercial land-lords and the possibility of lawsuits all around. And that's assuming that the law doesn't require auditing and/or some sort of compliance documentation. I don't think you're really allowing for how onerous even "simple" regulation can be when lawyers and bureaucrats get ahold of it.
cynicalkane 16y ago
From what I hear, commercial real estate is actually fairly easy to get into if you have the capital required--a lot for a person, but small compared to many other lines of business. One sufficiently intelligent person can certainly do it (I know one). But I think it suffers a different kind of barrier to entry. It's an unsexy line of business, and for people who want to own property it has to compete with mindshare for the far more familiar field of residential property management. So you don't see the average Joe thinking he can buy an office building and make it profitable--what does Joe know about office buildings, compared to houses and apartments?

ryanlchan 16y ago

Oligopolies, which are dependent on a limited number of competitors, are ripe for corruption, collusion, and cooperative behavior. This is pretty much exactly why the US has antitrust law. Its history is an interesting read on wikipedia if you have the time.

tptacek 16y ago
In exactly what sense is commercial real estate an oligopoly?!

billswift 16y ago

Government regulation is what creates most barriers to entry. In general, the most unethical industries and professions are those that are most tied in to government in the first place. Especially where government provides the barriers to entry - professional and occupational licensing being just the tip of the iceberg.

praptak 16y ago
"Government regulation is what creates most barriers to entry." Maybe the government regulation as practised by cronyist goverments. Seriously, I don't think that a hypothetical government enforcing standards for square feet measurement would create a huge barrier to entry into the property business.
- wake_up_sticky 16y ago
  One little thing like this isn't a huge barrier to entry, but a hundred little things like this make a whopper of a barrier to entry.
  - tptacek 16y ago
    The "little things" involved in setting up a restaurant are in totality encyclopedic, and yet mom-and-pop teams start restaurants every day in the US.
    - jeffffff 16y ago
      if you worry about what laws you might be breaking every time you want to do something, you'll never get anywhere. i suspect that most new restaurants are in violation of dozens if not hundreds of laws, but in reality they either aren't enforced or the owners are given an opportunity to fix whatever is wrong without penalty. follow the laws you know, don't go looking for ones you might be breaking, and when the government tells you that you're breaking a law remind them how many people you're employing.
      - tptacek 16y ago
        You're probably right in some sense, but there are many laws --- liquor licensing, health inspection, and employment, in particular --- that are actively enforced and a day-to-day reality for restauranteurs.
    - anamax 16y ago
      The money in commercial real estate is in larger projects. Govt gets more involved as the amount of money goes up. The NYC govt doesn't much care about a small deli. It gets seriously involved if you're developing a whole block, or trying to build a wal mart.
- VengefulCynic 16y ago
  As soon as there's a law about how to calculate square footage there will either be an agency to do the calculate the square footage, an agency to enforce it, or both. Oh, and some sort of tax/fee levied against commercial land-lords and the possibility of lawsuits all around. And that's assuming that the law doesn't require auditing and/or some sort of compliance documentation. I don't think you're really allowing for how onerous even "simple" regulation can be when lawyers and bureaucrats get ahold of it.

cynicalkane 16y ago

From what I hear, commercial real estate is actually fairly easy to get into if you have the capital required--a lot for a person, but small compared to many other lines of business. One sufficiently intelligent person can certainly do it (I know one). But I think it suffers a different kind of barrier to entry. It's an unsexy line of business, and for people who want to own property it has to compete with mindshare for the far more familiar field of residential property management. So you don't see the average Joe thinking he can buy an office building and make it profitable--what does Joe know about office buildings, compared to houses and apartments?